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Monday, March 19, 2012

Mining in Ozark County, Missouri

The reasons for pioneering and
establishing territory in the Ozarks’ past can be multifaceted and
numerous. Economic reasons often garnered the predominate foothold of this
ladder. Ozark County has always held a rich tradition and lore. But did it, at
one time, hold precious treasures such as gold and silver?

In the early history of Ozark County,
B. F. Shumard, Missouri geologist, completed a survey and a map was drawn about
1855 which shows locations of mineral deposits such as: carbonate of zinc,
iron, lead, and galena. Furthermore, there were 3 chalybeate or mineral springs
listed in the county. These were the main impetus that compelled much of the
exploration and mining of Ozark County.

Southeast Ozark County, 1855

According to another past Missouri
geologist, Charles Dake, “It is probably that this region offers better
prospects for glass, engine sand, and core sand than it does in most other
parts of the State.” Two sandstone quarries were being mined in Ozark County as
early as the 1850s. The location of these two quarries are difficult to locate
presently due to this mining was being done 160 years ago, the lack of
documentation, and the large amount of territory being discussed because
Douglas County was included as part of Ozark County.

Silver & Gold Mines

Gold
fever was prevalent in the latter part of the nineteenth century. Prospectors
were scouring through every holler, crag, and old Spanish legend for this
precious mineral. According to some newspapers, there were reports being
heralded from Ozark County.

Wheeling Register

11 February, 1890

Discovery of a Famous
Silver Mine.

Gainesville,
Mo.,
February 10- There is a great deal of excitement here over the reported finding
of an old silver mine in this county, Last week a man is said to have found on
top of a high ridge, a flat stone covered with rude letters with these
illegible words, Found this,” and with a mark pointing to the East. Searching
in the direction indicated, he found a circular opening arched over with
close-fitting stones. The finder excavated and found where drifts or runs had
been walled up. It is believed that this is an old silver mine, about which
marvelous stories were once told by the Indians, but which was lost years ago
and to find which many efforts have been made.

Ozark County News

18 January, 1894

L. D. Haskins, of the west part of the county, was in town
Saturday. He says the gold mines on Pond Fork are looming up. Large bodies of
land have been entered by a company formed for that purpose, and it is said to
be positively known that there is something valuable in the ore being taken out
there. The value, from assays made, is places at $80 per ton. We hope their
wildest dreams may be realized.

The Houston Daily
Post

25 January, 1894

Gold has been found in paying quantities on Pond Creek in
Ozark county, Missouri.

Ozark County News

1 February, 1894

On reading the account of discovery of gold in Ozark county
recently, Capt. Steve Johnson of this city wrote for a sample of the ore, and
received by mail a specimen of the alleged gold found at Pond Fork, Ozark
county. The sample is of a sugary-looking rock, approximating true quartzite.
Capt. Johnson who is an old California miner has no doubt of the correctness of
the assay of $80 to the ton, judging from the appearance of the sample, running
in streaks.

Mary Belle Green also sent in a few article that peak
my interest about her grandpa, Wiley Ellison, living
in southeastern corner of Ozark County and gold.

Douglas County
Herald, Ava Missouri
20 October, 1904

Gold in paying
quantities has been recently discovered on Liner Creek about 2 ½ miles from
Udall. The discovery was made on the farm of Wiley Ellison, and reports
compare favorably with the discovery made some weeks ago in the southeast part
of the county by N. M. Smith and those made in Taney County this summer.

Ozark County Times

4 February, 1916
Uncle Wiley Ellison an old resident of this county who owns a farm near the
Pumphrey Ford on the Big North Fork, 14 miles southeast of Gainesville, has
been claiming for a number of years that he has gold in paying quantities on
his land. Recently he had samples of the ore assayed and it proved to be 22
percent gold. He has refused an offer of $5000 for his mine.

Ozark County Times
24 October, 1919Uncle
Wiley Ellison got his new gasoline engine home Saturday. He is putting in a
mill and gin at Liner.

In sending these articles, Mary also wrote, “I wonder if he sold
some gold to purchase the engine? He also had a store at Liner somewhere
between the bridge and the old cabins. It took money to have these things;
so, maybe grandpa found enough gold to live on.”

Iron
& Zinc Mines

Independent land owners/prospectors
have worked small strip or surface mines in Ozark County since the 1850’s. For
those more adventurous, men have bored through existing caves, attempted in
manufacturing lateral shafts, and blown of shear bluffs with sticks of
dynamite. If any quantity of “jack” was produced, the inaccessibility to good
roads, bridges, and transportation hindered progress and monotonous in making
livable profits. One of the mines was owned by Isadora Bush as proprietor for
Newton Mining Company in the 1880’s.

The St. Joseph
Observer

19 February, 1916

Dreams hardly ever
come true. A few weeks ago an Ozark county man dreamed he found a gold mine on
the hills of his farm. The dreamer had little faith in visions and tried to
forget the incident but without avail. At last, just to prove there was nothing
in the dream, he took pick and shovel and started to work about 100 yards from
his home. His doubts were confirmed for all he found was a rich load of zinc
which promises to make him one of the richest men in the county.

Ozark County News

23 August, 1900

County Surveyor, Wonnacott, was in the city last week and
informed us that he was just from the west part of the county where he has been
doing work for several parties. He says that nearly all the vacant land in that
portion of the county has been taken up by speculators for the mineral and that
many are opening up and working mines extensively. Mr. Wonnacott thinks that
every 40-acre tract in 16-23 & 24 contains valuable zinc.

Ozark County Times

3 January, 1953

The King mine is located one-forth mile east of Bakersfield
and near a creek which supplies water for its operation. It is not operating
now, while new machinery is being installed to increase capacity, but will be
in operation again soon. It is within a few miles of the Alice mine which is
being reopened. Mr. King has operated a general store in Bakersfield for the
last 25 years but has leased his store and is now retiring. He plans to
continue with his livestock business on his farm.

By 1958, twelve men were working in one
mine near Elijah which was producing from one to two car loads of ore per day;
and six men were working in another mine near Bakersfield which was producing
one car load of ore per day. Four men were working in a third mine near Trail.
As late as 1963, the Missouri-Arkansas Mining Company was prospecting for ore
in the Bakersfield area.

The Alice Mine

Of all the mining prospects in Ozark
County’s
past,
the Alice Mine stood out as one of the most commercial and promising. The Alice
Mine was located on one of several large
zinc deposits in spanning between Ozark and Howell Counties in Missouri. The
Sharp Mine, in Ozark
County,
was also nearby,
and Howell
County
had
the Rex and the
G
& G mines. It was reported that
zinc carbonate ore had been mined, intermittently from these properties since
about 1890; estimated production was 85,000 tons of sorted and washed ore
varying in grade from 17 to 36 percent zinc.
From 1900 to 1904, approximately 6,000 tons of ore was shipped to
smelters and zinc oxide plants.

Ozark County News

25 January, 1900

Daniel Dwyer, proprietor of the Alice mines, and Col.
Glazier of Stillwater, Oklahoma, have land interests in the county, were both
in town yesterday on business. Mr. Dwyre has recently purchased another tract
of land adjoining the Alice mining property. The Alice mine is the only one in
Ozark county at present doing regular business from a commercial standpoint,
and the managers are continually increasing the facilities for more and better
work.

The Alice mine consisted of 240 acres;
it was an open pit approximately 30 by 250 feet and nearly 50 feet deep. Early
development of the mine included two drifts into the southwest side of the pit
on a level with the bottom of it. Two shafts were reported sunk from the bottom
of the pit to a depth of 50 to 60 feet. Over time, numerous old drifts and
shafts had become inaccessible.

As
the Alice Mine became particularly productive in the 1930’s, it was leased in
the 1930’s to Sidney Amyx and his sons. On St. Patrick's Day, the 17th
of March, 1933, a boiler explosion at Alice Mine took the life of George Harris
and injured several others.

Twelve men were injured, on fatally, and several of them
seriously, in a boiler explosion last Friday morning at the Amyx zinc mine,
near Caulfield, Mo., about 22 miles east of here.

George Harris was so severely injured he died that evening
about 4o’clock without regaining consciousness. Besides scalds it is believed
his back was broken. All the injured, including Harris, were taken to the Hogan
hospital at West Plains. All those hurt were badly scaled; some had broken
bones besides other injuries. The injured included S. F. Amyx, Homer Roberts,
Dave Sanders, 33; Henry Hensley, Raymond Hensley, 27; C. H. Bracket, Herbert
Briggs, William Briggs, Anderson Harris, Edward Wilson, all of Caulfield, and
Ralph Brown, 27, of Elijah.

After the tragic events of St.
Patrick’s Day, 1934, more work did occur at this mine. In the 1940’s, the Alice
mine was owned by G. E. Doane and Lee E. Ives of Poplar Bluff, MO. By 1942, the Alice was
selected as the first to be investigated by the Bureau of Mines in an effort to
demonstrate reserves and production of the district up to World War II.
Accordingly, these properties, the Alice, G & G, and Rex, were surveyed.
They were examined in November, 1942, by an engineer of the Bureau of Mines.
The diminishing national reserves of zinc ore had been at the forefront of
national security due to World War II. Therefore, and the U. S. considered
surveying sulfide ores by churn drilling.

A. L. Kidwell, geologist, studied and
mapped the Alice deposit, logged the drill holes, and advised on the direction
of the exploratory work. J. S. Cullison, of the Missouri School of Mines assisted
in the project. Also, the Missouri Geological Survey and Water Resources also
cooperated. Mr. Doane and Jack Johnson, mine foreman, furnished much useful
information regarding the earlier mining operations at the Alice and elsewhere
in the district. On August 20, 1944, the exploration in the Alice area had
begun, and finished September l6, 1944, by the North Range Mining Co. of
Minnesota; seven churn drill holes were drilled totaling 1,800 feet. Again,
more drilling was done on May 11, 1945, and completed on March 7, 1946, with a
Bureau-owned Star 71 churn drill. This 2 square mile district was centered on
the Alice pit. Measurements were taken at 1,000 foot intervals along a grid.

The Alice Mine Today.

Though silver, gold, or zinc mining is no longer
a part of Ozarks’ economy, its’ progenitors have etched traces of their
successes and tragedies in the soil. There is something in their character of exploration
and survival that should compel us on today. Furthermore, we should never let
the sands of time erase the etchings of their triumphs and struggles, which is
all a part of our Ozarks’ History.

Works Cited:

Alice Zinc Mine, Ozark County, Mo. Needham; Kreamalmyer.
May 1947. United States Department of the Interior. Washington D. C.

3 comments:

My family inherited 4 certificuts w/51 sharew per certif, --ozark land and mining co --incorporated under laws of territory of Arizona with last known location at 410 commonwealth trust bldgst louis,mo, also have twocertificates of WAR NECESSITY For construction work including cost of the two dunp trucks. Know of any interest in these4 such as a mining comany or collector.